As Manton hesitated, for the suggestion had its merits, the light from a car’s headlamps splayed against the curved wall of a warehouse in front of them.

‘Get moving,’ he said hoarsely.

Donner slammed the van into reverse and the rear wheels bounced over the kerb as he swung the wheel. They shot forward, one wheel bumping over Brady’s right foot, and drove away quickly as a small saloon car came round the curve behind them.

‘I don’t want it any closer than that,’ Donner said as they crossed the dual carriageway into another side street.

‘What do we do now?’

‘You can drop Jango and me on the next corner,’ Manton said. ‘Then turn into Canal Street and run this thing off Grainger’s Wharf. We don’t want to make it too easy for them. We’ll see you back at the club and make it fast. There’s Garvald to take care of, remember.’

‘Now that I look forward to,’ Donner said. ‘I really do.’

The man at the wheel of the saloon car was past his prime and the girl in the passenger seat was certainly not his wife, an added complication. He looked across in fascinated horror at the body which sprawled in the middle of the road and glanced nervously at the shadows crowding from the warehouse walls.

‘The rotten swine,’ the girl said. ‘Didn’t even stop.’

Her companion nodded, opened the door and walked across to Brady. When he came back he looked sick.

‘Blood all over his face, I think he’s dead.’

‘Then we’d better get out of here,’ the girl said briskly.

He turned, horror in his eyes. ‘We can’t just leave him here.’

‘Why not?’ she said brutally. ‘We certainly can’t do him any good. If it makes you feel any better, we can stop at the first call box. Dial 999, but don’t give your name.’ He sat there staring at her and she shrugged. ‘Of course, if you want to see your name in the paper …

It was all he needed. He switched on the motor and drove away quickly, leaving the horror behind him under the dim light of the old-fashioned gas lamp.

After a while, the body stirred and a strange, inhuman sob lifted in the throat. Jack Brady rolled on to his face and tried to push himself up, but the arm was broken and he slumped forward, his blood washing across the asphalt, waiting for them to come as he knew they would, hanging on to that final hidden reserve that is in all men and which refused to allow him to die.

The bell of the approaching patrol car, a cry in the night, was warm and comforting and it was only when he heard it that he let go and slid into darkness again.